My new Roubo #4: Final glue up of the bench top

There were points in this process that I didn’t think I’d get this far. I took some vacation time and spent the past few days trying to get the top finished up. My goal was to have it completely glued up before the first of the year.

I’m glad to say that despite a few set backs, I’m a week ahead of my goal. Not only is it a big motivational factor in a long bench building process, but it’ll also allow me to take a few days off to let my achy planing / sawing muscles (ie: my entire body) heal up and get some much-needed rest.

At this point, the bench top is 61” long, 24-1/2” wide, and 4-1/4” thick, with a little extra left to get it flat and square with final dimensions around 60” x 24” x 4”.

Here’s a picture of the completed bench top glued and clamped up for the night:

I filled one of these big contractor bags up with shavings roughly every two days. Once a bag is full, we dump it into the fire pit in the back yard, and burn them.

Here’s a picture of my old bench. It was built when I had been doing woodworking for a grand total of 2 weeks. My son and I built in one evening. It’s a haphazard, thrown-together 2×4, plywood, and hardboard monstrosity. It’s over 36” tall, weighs next to nothing, and can be a pain to work on. The vise is a $20 face vise from Lowes. Now, you can see why I’m so motivated to build a “real” bench. :)

Thanks, Drew. No doubt, they can be tricky for sure. Just moving the sections around the shop was a work out and a half. The total top weighs about 130 lbs. Moving the individual sections around (about 65 lbs each) was a challenge.

65 lbs isn’t all that heavy….except when it’s stretched out over 5 feet and you’re trying to move them around in a small shop without smacking everything around you. :)